The Favor of God
Key Verse: Luke 1:30
“Don’t be afraid, Mary”, the angel told her, “for you have found favor with God.”
Additional Reading: Psalms 90:17
It is probably difficult, but let’s try to put ourselves in Mary’s place when she heard from the angel that she had found favor with God! I don’t know about you but that would be the greatest news I could ever hear: “Ben, you have found favor with God.” Like many of you, we know the Bible tells us that God loves us, but for me anyway, I would love an angel to say those words to me, confirming what I really want to be true. Maybe you don’t struggle believing that God favors you or that He even likes you, but I have those negative thoughts at times! These thoughts hit me when I feel like I acted or reacted in an ungodly way or said some things that did not reflect the love of Christ in me.
The great news is, God gives His favor to underserving people who have put their faith in His Son Jesus. The fact is, the Bible recognizes God’s love to us as extremely generous: “See what great love the Father has lavished upon us…” (1 John 3:1).
As we march through another year of our lives, will this be a year of fully recognizing and rejoicing over the favor we have received from our Father in heaven? We all know that the devil will never stop putting his lies in our heads. The evil one loves to take our failures and use them against us to take our joy and peace. There is only one or two ways to fight these attacks; one way is to be perfect in all our thoughts and performance as a Christ-follower. (I’ve tried this and failed every time!) The other way to fight the devil’s lies is to recite some truths of God’s Word, the Bible, to every thought the devil throws at us. I use the scripture found in 2 Timothy 2:13, “If we are unfaithful, He (God) remains faithful…” Another scripture that is a great one to throw at the Devil’s lies is Ephesians 2:8-9: “It is by grace you have been saved, through faith-this is not of yourself, it is a gift of God- not by works so no one can boast”. Remind yourself that the word “grace” means unmerited or unearned favor of God. Continue to remind yourself that you have faith in God’s Word, not the devil’s lies! Remember what the Bible says about the evil one, he is a liar and a father of lies (John 8:44).
An important question that always comes to mind with the above approach to dealing with our failures: does it matter to God that we have failed? The answer is “yes”; God wants us to shine bright for Him to the lost world around us and we do that by conquering our sins and failures, as much as possible in this life. The Bible tells us “not to grieve the Holy Spirit…” (Ephesians 4:30). In another scripture, the Apostle Paul testified that, “I discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should. Otherwise, I fear that after preaching to others I myself might be disqualified” (1 Corinthians 9:27).
Every time a Christ-follower fails, our thoughts should be “thanks be to God that I know He will forgive me and continue to love me; however, I am going to keep trying to give God my best!” When we sin, and have no concern about it, the devil has won. Think of an athlete when they fail: would they get any better if they had no concern about their failure? Of course not. If they quit every time they failed, they wouldn’t get better and no longer even compete.
Let’s summarize… God has found favor in you and me. He will always be faithful to us and because of that, we will daily give Him our best!
Father, thank you for you grace, mercy and love. Today, I will live out my life for you, do my best to shine bright to those who still live in darkness. In Jesus’s Name, amen.